30 comments

Gunz45

kitkatceo

Banning a breed of animal that WE screwed around with & overbreed especially for non-desirable traits (aggression & fighting) & then selling a larger majority of them to inexperienced & innappropriate handlers & owners who either negated their responsibility to raise, train, & control the dog PROPERLY AND CONSISTENTLY is NOT an acceptable solution to cleaning up a mess that WE created. We need to fix ourselves, then fix the breed, not ban it to extinction because of our stupidity.

Billy Pounds

Breed specific legislation will not occur in Memphis/Shelby Co because Federal Judge Bernice Donald ruled against it around 89-90…RAOT paid a lot of money to see that people wanting BSL would be doing just that…WANTING

toby

Cindy

The two dogs in that photo are not pit bulls. So show me the pit bulls that are doing the deed. Don’t show me a German Shepard and a mix breed and say they are pit bulls. That is how they have such a bad reputation. Don’t add to the hate. The same thing has happened to Rottweilers and Dobermans in the past. Get the facts straight if you are going to share the story. IT IS NOT THE BREED IT IS THE OWNERS. Pits are some of the most loving, loyal animals you could ever ask for. But like any other animal if raised and trained to be vicious that is what they will be!!!!!

Cindy

So you have removed the picture and put in a video that still is not conclusive it is pit bulls. You cannot tell from the video since you never see the faces of the dogs. Please change your story to wild dogs until you know without a doubt they are pit bulls. These poor dogs don’t need any more bad publicity. And if they are mix breeds then is it not possible that it is not the “pit bull” in them making them vicious? They may well just be hungry!

They are feral dogs, not “wild.” And it is sensational writing to call them “on the prowl.” Dogs in a pack exhibit different behavior than one or two dogs. And it is the City, with a capital C, a govt. entity, which is being called to deal with this unfortunate situation. Please stop calling the dogs “pits” until you know conclusively that they are pit bull terriers. It is irresponsible, and poor, sensational reporting.

“There is no direct eye contact or very little direct eye contact. It is very quick and over with. Which is one reason why with pit bulls and rottweilers, we have problems. Because they’re bred to do direct eye contact and so they are off putting to other dogs and actually scary to other dogs.”

The fourth undesirable characteristic – arousal or excitement – is actually the most problematic. Many bully dogs cannot seem to calm themselves down once they get excited. And once they get excited all their behaviors are exacerbated.

Thus, if a dog is over-confident and has a tendency to body slam or mount, he or she will really crash into the other dog or person when he’s aroused, sometimes inadvertently causing injury. He may begin to play-bite, and then bite harder and harder and harder.

When you try to stop the behavior, the dog often becomes even more “aggressive.” In this way, play can turn into aggression fairly quickly. Research on the brain has shown that excited play has exactly the same chemistry as extreme anger. This allows a play behavior to switch quickly into aggression. And, once the dog has become aggressive a few times, the switch is much easier.

MICHAEL BURNS, Los Angeles Animal Control Lt.
You have a dog that has aggressive tendencies enhanced through constant and incestuous breeding. If there are some recessive genes on the aggressive or psychotic side, they will make themselves manifest.

They are different. There’s an absence of the normal sounds a dog makes when it attacks. It’s almost a workmanlike way they hold on in an attack. It’s a persistence I haven’t seen in any other breed.

KURT LAPHAM, a field investigator for the West Coast Regional office of the Humane Society
Most breeds do not multiple-bite. A pit bull attack is like a shark attack: He keeps coming back.

DAVID GENDREGSKE, Clare County MI Animal Control Director
“In my opinion they appeal to the most irresponsible pet owners and to younger people,” he said.

“The younger people have no jobs to support the animal, or they have to move where animals aren’t allowed and (the dogs) end up here.” Certain people like pit bulls because they are intimidating, he said. “They want to scare people. It’s an intimidation thing.

They’re number one with those being incarcerated. If there’s a dog left behind (when someone is sentenced to jail or prison), it’s always a pit bull,” he said. He cited the time a pit bull got out of a car and attacked a horse.

He was pulled off, but he went back and grabbed the throat. He was pulled off again and again and went back after different parts of the horse. “What kind of a dog but a pit bull would do that?” he asked. “All dogs can bite but not with that ferocity. “ Some people will say that how a pit bull acts and reacts is dependent upon how the dog is raised, he said.

“But he was raised to kill for centuries,” he said. “You can’t breed it out in one generation.” If the popularity of pit bulls is a fad, it’s a long term one, he said. “I keep seeing more and more pit bulls,” he said. “It’s getting worse.”

Pit bulls, he said, are not good as a working dog, except for perhaps wild boar hunting. “And they’re not one of the smarter breeds,” he said, despite other’s beliefs that they are intelligent.

KEVIN COUTTS, Head Dog Ranger, Rotorua, New Zealand
There was concern among dog authorities about American pitbulls being allowed into New Zealand as they were dangerous, unpredictable animals, Mr Coutts said.

“A lot of people in this town get them because they are a staunch dog and they will fight. They are perceived as vicious … It’s frustrating they were ever allowed in the country … we can’t go back now though,” Mr Coutts said.

COUTTS’ comment on a pit car mauling
This sort of thing happens when people own this breed of dog and then don’t look after them.

VICTORIA STILWELL, celebrity dog trainer
Presas are not to be fooled with, they’re dangerous. You’ve got a fighting breed here. You’ve got a dog that was bred for fighting. You’ve got one of the most difficult breeds to handle.

CESAR MILAN, celebrity dog trainer
“Yeah, but this is a different breed…the power that comes behind bull dog, pit bull, presa canario, the fighting breed – They have an extra boost, they can go into a zone, they don’t feel the pain anymore. He is using the bulldog in him, which is way too powerful, so we have to ‘make him dog’ (I guess as in a “regular” dog) so we can actually create the limits.

So if you are trying to create submission in a fighting breed, it’s not going to happen. They would rather die than surrender.”. If you add pain, it only infuriates them..to them pain is that adrenaline rush, they are looking forward to that, they are addicted to it…

That’s why they are such great fighters.” Cesar goes on to say…”Especially with fighting breeds, you’re going to have these explosions over and over because there’s no limits in their brain.”

GARRETT RUSSO, dog trainer
I estimate Medical & Veterinary bills related to injuries caused by pit bulls in the Tompkins Square dog run in 2011, $140,000.00. Estimated Medical (human) & Veterinary (canine) bills from all other breeds and mixed breeds combined during the same period, $5,000.00. (Estimate gathered from reports to by owners to the dog park association.)

STEVE DUNO, dog trainer, pit bull owner
“The dogs that participated in these attacks weren’t Pekingese. You don’t have herds of Pekingese roaming the city attacking people. When someone says all breeds are created equal, well then they’re denying the definition of what a breed is. Breed serves a particular purpose.”

“I like them. They’re eager. They’re athletic. They’re aesthetically pleasing. But even if they’re bred perfectly, they can be problematic, particularly with other dogs.”

“When you combine the breed specific behaviors … with owners who either don’t give a rip, or with owners who (have) too much dog, you have a problem.”

JEAN DONALDSON, dog trainer
Most commonly, she sees dogs with aggression problems. While she’s a fierce opponent of “breed bans” like the proposed outlawing of pit bulls that San Francisco debated two years ago, she believes it’s undeniable that some breeds are predisposed to violence.

Many breeds that were bred as guardians or fighting dogs were carefully designed to not like strangers, she says. She thinks it’s disingenuous of breeders to further enhance this trait, and then expect owners to compensate with training.

ARLENE STERLING, Newaygo County, MI Chief Animal Control Officer
“It is genetically inbred in them to be aggressive. They can be very nice dogs, but they are very prey driven and they are extremely strong. It makes them high risk dogs and it makes them extremely dangerous.”

BOB KERRIDGE, New Zealand SPCA executive director
“That is the only real way to solve this problem – is to license owners and to give them the responsibility that goes with owning a dog. It would be extremely useful when you have a neighbour who is concerned about that dog next door. You can look at it and see they don’t have a license and take it away. That’s owner responsibility.”

“We led the charge to stop the importation of the pitbull because of the concerns they would be crossbred with other dogs… But there’s not a lot we can do about that because it’s happened. We wish someone had listened all those years ago.”

JIM CROSBY, pit bull hired gun
“Line breeding tends to concentrate recessive traits. The propensity for violent attacks by a dog would be a recessive trait.”

MELANIE PFEIFFER, veterinary assistant
Working in a veterinary hospital, you are exposed to all kinds of animal trauma. One of the more common ones is dog fights. I can honestly say that in three out of four cases, an American pit bull terrier is involved. Many times, we are able to save the life of the afflicted, but yesterday, we were not.

I propose that all owned American pit bull terriers be registered and all breeding be halted indefinitely. How many mutilated faces, mangled limbs, butchered pets and even human deaths does it take to convince us that this breed needs to be phased out?

DIANE JESSUP, Washington pit bull owner and expert
“It’s not sensible to get an animal bred for bringing a 2,000-pound bull to its knees and say I’m going to treat this like a soft-mouth Labrador,” says Jessup, the former animal-control officer. She blames novice owners, as much as actual criminals, for bringing the breed into disrepute. “It’s a capable animal, and it’s got to be treated as such.”

JOHN ROCKHOLT, South Carolina dogman
“It’s inhumane not to allow them to fight. If you have to encourage them to fight they are not worth the powder it would take to blow them away. To never allow them any kind of combat…That’s inhumane.”

RAY BROWN, former pit bull owner, breeder, dog fighter
Pit bulls didn’t become dangerous because we fight them; we fight them because the English specifically bred them to be dangerous.

MARK PAULHUS, HSUS southeast regional coordinator
If it chooses to attack, it’s the most ferocious of all dogs. I’ve never known of a pit bull that could be called off (during a fight). They lose themselves in the fight.

F.L. DANTZLER, HSUS director of field services
“They’re borderline dogs. They’re right on the edge all of the time. Even if the dogs are not trained or used for fighting, and even though they are generally good with people, their bloodline makes them prone to violence.”

ARTHUR HERM, veterinarian, animal control
He said he disagrees with those people who believe they can train aggressiveness out of dogs, and added he believes aggressiveness is “inherent” and “genetic” in all dogs while pit bulls “seem to have more of that.”

MICHAEL W. FOX, veterinarian, animal behaviorist
“I spent 20 years studying the behavior of dogs and it’s not in their nature. Man, has created a monster, If you wish…These dogs were selectively bred to fight, they have greater propensity to fight than other animals, which is brought out in training.”

“They can attack people, and because the attitudes of Pit Bulls it is more likely they will attack people. The worry is the power of the dogs jaw…to bite and not let go. It’s quite sufficient to crush right through a child’s arm or leg.”

SHERYL BLAIR, Tufts Veterinary School symposium – Animal Aggression: Dog Bites and the Pit Bull Terrier
The injuries these dogs inflict are more serious than other breeds because they go for the deep musculature and don’t release; they hold and shake.

Colleen Hodges, Veterinary Public Health spokeswoman
Some families think that they can raise a loving pet if they treat a pit bull like any other dog. They may not realize that the dog was bred to fight and that some of these dogs may have fighting in their genes.
They are tough, strong, tenacious. They are much more capable of inflicting serious damage, and some of them do. I would not recommend pits as a family dog.

GARY WILKES, animal behaviorist
No other breed in America is currently bred for fighting, in such great numbers as the American Pit Bull Terrier. No other breed has instinctive behaviors that are so consistently catastrophic when they occur, regardless of how rarely they happen.

The reality is that every English Pointer has the ability to point a bird. Every Cattle Dog has the ability to bite the heel of a cow and every Beagle has the ability to make an obnoxious bugling noise when it scents a rabbit or sees a cat walking on the back fence. Realistically, if your English Pointer suddenly and unpredictably points at a bird in the park, nobody cares.

If my Heeler nips your ankle, I’m going to take care of your injuries and probably be fined for the incident. If your Beagle bugles too much, you’ll get a ticket for a noise violation. If your Pit Bull does what it’s bred to do…well, you fill in the blank.

33 People dead by dog attack in 2013.
Pit bull type dogs killed thirty of them. sixteen of the twenty-nine dead are children.
Stars indicate people killed by a ‘family’ pit bull – ones that had been raised and cherished as an indoor pet, ‘never showed aggression before’, and knew the victim.

If 27 of 33 dead were killed by pit bull attack, that’s 82% dead by pit attack, 9% dead by ‘molosser’, 3% by some kind of GSD mix, 3% by a husky + possibly pit mix, 3% by Shiba Inu.

If you count the pit-mix mastiffs as pit bull types, that’s 91% killed by attacking pit bull types. Pit types are only about 5% of the entire dog population.

The man who ran into traffic kept pit bulls himself. He knew perfectly well what the two stranger pit bulls that were chasing him would do if they caught him, so he preferred to risk a swift death by oncoming car.

In 2008, the City of Wapato passed an ordinance that bans new pit bulls, rottweilers and mastiffs. Nine months after its adoption, in March 2009, Wapato Police Chief Richard Sanchez reported successful results:

“Nine months into the ban and police calls about vicious dogs have been cut in half. The Wapato Police tell Action News they’ve gone from 18 reports in January, February and March of last year to seven so far in ’09. “Seven calls in three months… that’s nothing,” says Chief Richard Sanchez, Wapato Police Department.

When the City of Woonsocket was debating a pit bull ordinance in June 2009, the animal control supervisor in Pawtucket, John Holmes, spoke about the enormous success of Pawtucket’s 2003 pit bull ban:

“Holmes says he predicted that it would take two years for Pawtucket to experience the full benefit of the law after it was passed, but the results were actually apparent in half the time.

“It’s working absolutely fantastic,” said Holmes. “We have not had a pit bull maiming in the city since December of 2004.”
***************************************************
Per section 8-55 of Denvers pit bull ban:

A pit bull, is defined as any dog that is an APBT, Am Staf Terrier, Staff Bull Terrier, or any dog displaying the majority of physical traits of anyone (1) or more of the above breeds, or any dog exhibiting those distinguishing characteristics which substantially conform to the standards set by the AKC or UKC for any of the above breed.

Over the course of 22 years, the Denver ban has withstood numerous battles in state and federal courts. It has been used as a model for over 600 USA cities that legislate pit bulls, as well as US Navy, Air Force, Marine and Army bases ( so much for Sgt Stubby).

without it, we’d see just what we see in Miss E’s lame replies. Every pit owner would claim their land shark was anything but a pit bull.

Miami Dade county voted 66% to keep their pit bull ban, just as it is worded, last year.

Note that they admit that the pit bull ban did not reduce the number of bites, but it did reduce the severity of bites reported by all breeds. Proof that when pit bull deniers find a jurisdiction that banned pit bulls, but reported no decrease in overall bites, is a moot point. Its death and dismemberment we are focusing on, not bite counts.

In the monthly city newsletter, In Touch, published in September 2006, the City of Salina reported that the pit bull ban adopted in 2005 significantly reduced pit bull biting incidents in just a 12 month period.

The number of pit bull bites depicted in the “Salina Pit Bull Bites Reported” graph shows 2002 with 13 pit bull bites, 2003 with 11 pit bull bites, 2004 with 15 pit bull bites and 2005 with only one bite. The newsletter notes that “animal bites reported have remained constant, but the severity of bites have decreased dramatically” since the enactment of the pit bull ban.
***************************************************
Springfield, MO

In April 2008, the Springfield-Greene County Health Department released data to a local TV station – following the City of Springfield’s adoption of a 2006 pit bull ban:

“The Springfield-Greene County Health Department reports that dog bites and vicious dog complaints are declining since the implementation of the Pit Bull Ordinance in the City of Springfield two years ago. In 2005 the health department fielded 18 vicious dog complaints, but only eight in 2007. Bites were down from 102 in 2005 to 87 in 2007.”

Rose Base, director of the Salina Animal Shelter who lobbied for the ordinance, told the Salina Journal:

The ordinance has made a difference, she said. Records at the Salina Animal Shelter indicate there were 24 reported pit bull bites in 2003 and 2004, and only five since — none from 2009 to present.

Salina has 62 registered pit bulls, Base said. Before the ordinance she guessed there were “close to 300.” Since the first of this year three of the registered pit bulls have died of old age.

“We definitely haven’t had the severity of bites that we had in the past,” Base said. “Our community has been somewhat safer because of the law that was passed
***************************************************
Prince George’s County, MD
Prince George’s County passed a pit bull ban in 1996. In August 2009, Rodney Taylor, associate director of the county’s Animal Management Group, said that the number of pit bull biting incidents has fallen:

“Taylor said that during the first five to seven years of the ban, animal control officials would encounter an average of 1,200 pit bulls a year but that in recent years that figure has dropped by about half. According to county statistics, 36 pit bull bites, out of 619 total dog bites, were recorded in 2008, down from 95 pit bull bites, out of a total of 853, in 1996.”

In a discussion of the Denver ban, Assistant City Attorney Kory Nelson recently told the San Francisco Chronicle that:

“Since 1989, when that city instituted a pit bull ban, ‘we haven’t had one serious pit bull attack,’ said Kory Nelson, a Denver assistant city attorney. His city’s assertion that ‘pit bulls are more dangerous than other breeds of dog’ has withstood legal challenges, he said.

‘We were able to prove there’s a difference between pit bulls and other breeds of dogs that make pit bulls more dangerous,’ he said.”

In a November 2011, public health statistics published by Global Toronto showed that pit bull bites dropped dramatically after Ontario adopted the Dog Owners Liability Act in 2005, an act that banned pit bulls:

The number of dog bites reported in Toronto has fallen since a ban on pit bulls took effect in 2005, public health statistics show.

A total of 486 bites were recorded in 2005. That number fell generally in the six years following, to 379 in 2010.

Provincial laws that banned ‘pit bulls,’ defined as pit bulls, Staffordshire terriers, American Staffordshire terriers, American pit bull terriers and dogs resembling them took effect in August 2005. Existing dogs were required to be sterilized, and leashed and muzzled in public.

Bites in Toronto blamed on the four affected breeds fell sharply, from 71 in 2005 to only six in 2010. This accounts for most of the reduction in total bites.

Cindy

So Darrin Stephens you have done your one sided research. So I can deduce that you do not like pits. So I can do the same research to prove they are not vicious. From your thought process should we outlaw guns because idiots use them too? Any person or animal is not inherently vicious. They have to learn it.

Dayna

I’ve yet to meet a pitbull with a “furry” upright & curled tail as depicted in the video clips at the end of this segment. Shame on the reporter for not mentioning that or making a sincere effort to correctly identify the dogs – using someone else’s words in an inflammatory means against a specific breed is lazy and irresponsible.

Despite the inaccurate breed identification (which ignorant or uneducated people so often seem to do), the problem of unclaimed (stray) dogs isn’t a new one to Memphis.

Any animal forced to survive on it’s own is going to seek out a food source. Beyond that fact, even a healthy dog with an owner that isn’t hungry is JUST as likely to chase and/or kill a cat if given the opportunity.

Why doesn’t someone try FEEDING them (without the poison, thanks) and humanely trap them so that they can be rehabilitated or rescued?

There are several rescues and trappers in the Memphis area that would probably help if asked…

Joma

East Memphis is a fairly large area and if you’re going to “inform” the public via this method, may I suggest you give a better idea as to location. Many parents COULD BE ON THE LOOKOUT; my advice to them, go locked and loaded. Sadly, we don’t know where to look.

Tack

Anyone who says “Pit Bulls are not inherently violent” need to explore why certain dogs make good hunters and others don’t. Why the police use certain dogs rather than others to do certain jobs.

Sure a Pit can be trained to be nice and sweet, but instinct and heritage plays a large part in a dog’s choices.

Take a Australian Shepard dog who’s never seen a flock of sheep, turn him loose with them, and watch what happens! He automatically herds them into a group…. not quite knowing why. Same thing with a Golden Retriever….. you throw something and instinctively they want to go after it. Now, turn a Charles Spaniel loose with sheep and watch what happens. Take a Pomeranian and throw a Frisbee and see what it does.

Certain dogs are more prone/bred to do certain things well. And Pit Bulls have been fighting dogs their entire existence. Even today! Why don’t you ever see dog fighting rings use poodles?

Jennifer

To TACK any animal can be vicious. Just ask my sister who had to have nine stitches after being attacked by a poodle. A dog that she had been around for years. Just ask the owner (my neighbor) of the poodle who was attacked by an Australian Shepard. Maybe the AS thought the poodle was a sheep and was trying to herd it.

All animals have animal instincts and fight or flight takes over. So does the instinct to survive. People have the same instincts. Just try to hurt a child with her mother around. See what happens. If I remember history correctly the Donner party became cannibals to survive.

I think the point to the whole debate was that the video does not show pit bulls and they already have a bad reputation and don’t need anymore when no one has positively identified the dogs as pit bulls.

Of the 4,481 dogs involved in fatal and disfiguring attacks on humans occurring in the U.S. & Canada since September 1982, when I began logging the data, 3,026 (67%) were pit bulls; 545 were Rottweilers; 3,826 were of related molosser breeds, including pit bulls, Rottweilers, mastiffs, boxers, and their mixes. Of the 533 human fatalities, 278 were killed by pit bulls; 85 were killed by Rottweilers; 400 (75%) were killed by molosser breeds. Of the 2,689 people who were disfigured, 1,806 (67%) were disfigured by pit bulls; 319 were disfigured by Rottweilers; 2,259 (83%) were disfigured by molosser breeds. Pit bulls–exclusive of their use in dogfighting–also inflict more than 70 times as many fatal and disfiguring injuries on other pets and livestock as on humans, a pattern unique to the pit bull class. Surveys of dogs offered for sale or adoption indicate that pit bulls and pit mixes are less than 6% of the U.S. dog population; molosser breeds, all combined, are 9%.